


Heaviside Goals

by Jameson9101322



Category: Cats - Andrew Lloyd Webber
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-05-15
Packaged: 2020-03-05 19:28:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18835213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jameson9101322/pseuds/Jameson9101322
Summary: Exotica is one of the loneliest and most outcast Jellicles in the junkyard, at least according to her. But she's not stupid, she can take a hint. If they don't want her around, she knows what to do to get the second chance she deserves...





	Heaviside Goals

No one ever notices me, or talks to me or tries to be nice to me -- not even as a pity friend. You'd think with my smooth coat and sleek features, I'd be popular... I mean, Cassandra is popular, and I look a lot like her so I don't understand why she's hot stuff and I'm invisible. I never join in games or dance. I've brooded in the same spot for days before while cat after cat just walked by like I was nothing. They never notice me. I'm so done with everything.

So I'm going to the Heavyside Layer!

The first step in my plan is to get in the program for the next ball. If Old Deuteronomy sees me sing and dance he'll _have_ to pick me! I mean, I am beautiful... even if the common strays in this outfit don't notice it. In order to get into the program, I have to talk to the Emcee... our favorite silver tabby, Munkustrap, who is extremely popular and totally lucky except for the part where he keeps getting ripped to shreds by Macavity. I'd take the lashings for popularity. I think its worth it.

"Munkustrap!"

He was talking with a couple other toms, ignoring me like usual. I couldn't wait for him to finish -- he has a home where he belongs, lucky jerk -- the Jellicle moon was high enough to get him started on event coordination. The cats with him were Alonso and Asparagus, who always had Munkustrap's attention. He liked them a lot even though Asparagus is all old and stuff. Alonso's cute, but he fancies Cassandra. Figures... the viper strikes again.

"Munkustrap!" I crawled along a beat-up auto chassis and positioned myself over their heads.

"Bustopher wants in again." Alonso was saying.

"Again?" Munkustrap said. "Does he realize what the point of these proceedings are? We are not one of his gentlemen's clubs, and he's said before he doesn't want to pass on... he's having far to much fun gorging himself to death."

"He wants the limelight." Asparagus said.

"I know I know." Munkustrap dismissed. "We'll slide him in early... with any luck Deuteronomy will show up late again and miss him completely."

"Munkustrap!" I hovered a little closer. "Up here! Hey! WOAH! AAK!"

That was the sound of me slipping off the car and landing on top of him. He arched his back and rolled me into the middle of the three. He was probably embarrassed about not noticing me before it happened, since he's supposed to be aware of things like people sneaking up from behind him shouting his name. Munkustrap twitched on ear. "Exotica... Hi."

"Hi." I contorted back to onto my feet and approached with a little sugar in my tone. "Sorry about that, I guess I lost my footing. I wanted to speak to you."

He put on a smile to match my phony sweetness. "Later Exotica, please. We are in the middle of something."

"Planning the Ball?"

"Yes, so you can see how important - "

"But that's exactly what I wanted to talk about!" I thrust myself closer to Munkustrap, passing a foreleg demurely in front of my face. Alonso and Asparagus exchanged a skeptical glance around me, but I ignored them except for my twitching tail. "I want to have a song this year."

"A song?" Munkustrap smirked, more amused than impressed. "What would you sing about?"

"About how I want to go to the Heaviside Layer." I said in utter seriousness.

Munkustrap eased back on his haunches and also into a deep look of understanding. "The Heaviside Layer."

"Yes." I answered. "I want to go."

"You're awful young. Are you sure you want to go now?"

"Yes I'm sure." I reiterated. "I've given this a lot of thought." Like, in the hours I spend loathing myself every day.

He shook his head. I could tell he doubted my integrity. "Exotica, dear, really... you have lives ahead of you. Old Deuteronomy would never pick you, even if you had the most moving dance he'd ever seen. He believes in second-chances and perseverance." Munkustrap raised a paw to my chin but I backed away from it. He lost the concern in his voice. "Have some perspective."

"I've done all the thinking and planning you could ever want me to do." I snapped. "I want my second chance now. I want to go to the Heaviside Layer and the only way I can do it is if you put me in the show."

He smirked a little.

I arched an eyebrow. "Do it or I'll claw you."

"Try it and you'll regret it." Hissed Alonso who had the nerve to butt into my very important and private conversation.

Munkustrap gestured for him to chill. Alonso obedienctly backed down, but kept a venomous stare glued to me from then out. 

Asparagus raised his chin to Munkustrap. "I think she's serious."

"Yes, I'm serious," I said. "I'm going."

Munkustrap blinked slowly. "If that is what you really want I will give you a slot, but I'm telling you now you won't be chosen. The Jellicle Choice is Old Deuteronomy's. He'll chide you, pet you, tell you of the infinite faith he has in you, but he'll never let you pass on while you have so much time left to find happiness on your own. He's lived long enough to know that lives take different turns, and would ascend himself before he cut yours short."

"Thank you for the slot." I slinked out of his space. "Excuse me, I must prepare my act."

I returned to my friendless shadow with Alonso hissing after me.

~~~

The second step in my plan was to come up with an act. I pondered about what angle I should take to impress my patriarch. Should I sing of my beauty? Of my gorgeously lined face and dark brown coat? Or do I sing of my epic loneliness and stir his heart with tales of woe and rejection? That's what Grizabella did last year and it seemed to work. Maybe I shouldn't sing at all and communicate all I needed to say through the majestic swaying of my back and careful arching of my slender limbs?

I decided to complain to music and hope the Grizabella card didn't wear out with repetition.

"A face so dark it fades into the night! A day so lonely she forgets that it's light! Exotica!" I rehearsed out on the paddock knowing no one would notice me there. "Exotica! The queen of the queens who no one sees!"

"Exotica."

Everlasting Cat someone saw me! I whirled around to spot Alonso's black and white mug on the open drainpipe and my hopes dashed again. He noticed me because he's still made at me. I glared. "Oh its you."

"Your song is awful." He stated. "You should give up now."

"What an explosion of confidence." I returned to dancing. "I think you're lying. I think my song is wonderful and you want me to quit because I'm going to prove Munkustrap wrong."

"No, your song is actually awful. The only way it'll succeed is if Deuteronomy sends you on to shut you up."

"Then I guess it will have worked then," I said. "Don't you have other cats to ogle?"

"You're the one complaining about being lonely, yet the minute you have an audience and you're driving him off."

"You're not an audience, you're a heckler." I said. "I have lyrics to write if you don't mind..."

He took on a less aggressive posture. "Is being lonely all your problem is?"

"No, you're a problem too."

"You know, if you were nicer to people they might talk to you. You ever think that your problem was you?"

"I gave people their chance." I dismissed.

He headed back up the rubbish, leaving a pearl of wisdom behind for me to play with. "You know, Grizabella ended her song with hope and passed on with gratitude. If I were Old Deuteronomy..."

"Yeah whatever, go pretend to be Deuteronomy somewhere else."

He narrowed his eyes on me. "Your song is still awful."

He left me alone for real, but I couldn't help taking his words into consideration. Grizabella left with a bit of hope? She did see the next morning as another chance to reclaim the happiness of her past, I recall her saying that. And when she climbed into the sky she looked like her every dream had come true.

I could act it. I'd gotten this far. And my lyrics were timeless, Alonso had no idea what he was talking about.

I would make it to the Heaviside Layer.

I had to.

It was the only way I could be happy.

~~~

Step three in the plan was to actually win Deuteronomy's favor. Unfortunately the ball was a full three days away, so I was left to imagine this part. I thought about him watching my dance with tears in his eyes. He would listen to my song and cut me short saying "No more! This pathetic creature is the most poetic thing in this world... she deserves to pass into the next, it would be a crime to keep her here where she is unwanted!"

For some reason his speech got longer every time he made it.

I took a break from staring at the sky and imagining to dance a little more. I had this great double back bend planned that took me from all fours over the top of my head then back to the ground on the other side like a contortionist. It was a genius move, I'd patted myself on the back a lot for it.

I'd just started when I heard my name again.

"Exotica." Mukustrap was sitting on the drain pipe this time. "Talk to me a second."

"What?" I asked, mid-bend. "Did Alonso tattle on me?"

"You should be glad he did. He gave you half the lecture I was planning for you and saved us both the trouble."

"Only half? Darn." I rolled back to my feet and crossed my arms elegantly across my chest.

He looked weary, and I couldn't tell if it was because of me or something else. With a sigh, he took up where Alonso left off. "I know you think you're doing the right thing, but you can't earn your way into the next life."

"This is repetitive."

"I'm sorry." He seemed sincere as far as I could tell. "I don't know another way to convince you. If you won't listen to reason, then I beg you to consider the possibility that you won't be chosen. I'm afraid, with the way you are thinking now..."

"Afraid of what?" I cut in.

He pulled a peculiar expression I'd never seen on his face before. It was nothing sappy like pity or condescending like a teacher or a father, it was really hard to describe. It involved something weird with his eyebrows... something that said "I wasn't expecting you to interrupt me like that but upon reflection I'm not all that surprised." What made him think he knew me that well? 

He recomposed himself and spoke simply. "Afraid that you'd hurt yourself."

"Don't be stupid." I hissed. "I'm not a masochist like you."

"Hmph." He cocked his head a moment. "Okay, I'll give up figuring that one out for now. Maybe you won't hurt yourself physically, but you'll hurt yourself mentally and emotionally like you have been for so long. I've noticed you sitting still for days before... not talking, ignoring anyone who passed and never eating or sleeping."

I dropped my pose. "You noticed that?"

"Yes. Others did too. They came to me about it. You worry them sometimes."

"No I don't." I insisted, but he was shaking me up. Had I missed something in my reverie? Did people really stop and ask? Try to get my attention? I couldn't remember. "I'm invisible to them. That's why I deserve to go to the Heaviside Layer... the cats there are all sparkly and perfect and will give me a second chance."

"You should try giving your friends here a second chance," Munkustrap said. "A conversation takes both parties. The only person you talk to is yourself."

"When you're not bothering me."

He shrugged and heaved another beleaguered sigh. "Alright, point taken. I've said all I had anyway." He didn't pause for effect like Alonso did, but he did leave a pearl behind. "Things wont be different in the second life if you don't take the effort to make them that way."

I gave up rehearsing. I stood in the middle of the clearing where anyone could see me and pondered over everything Munkustrap and Alonso had said or tried to say. There was a lot there and it took a couple hours to get through it all. In the midst of it, a slinky female cat eased up behind me. I felt her study the hairs on the back of my neck. She moved around to my face. "Exotica?"

"Cassandra?"

"What are you doing out here?"

"Thinking." I answered. "About my dance at the ball."

"I heard you were dancing," she said. "I heard it was awful."

"You heard it from Alonso."

"Yes I did." She smiled a little wryly. "I don't think you should dance it."

"Why not?" I tried to ice my words but was still unsettled. "Because I'll injure onlookers?"

"No, because it'd be a shame to see you go," Cassandra said. "I always thought of you as a sort of little sister to me. A quiet one, quite obviously but we look so very similar. I can only assume we share a lineage somewhere in this city."

My hackles bristled. "You never made me feel like a sister before."

"Perhaps not." She moved fluidly away. "But then again, I was never good at that kind of thing."

Standing alone on the paddock again I was starting to feel strange, like a million eyes were on me. And this is weird for me. I'd lived so long thinking I was the only one who bothered to care about me...

It would take far too much time to think it over. I had to practice if I wanted to be chosen at the ball. But I was too distracted to practice. The thoughts took hold of me and I sat on the drainpipe for hours in deep all-consuming personal reflection. 

Before I knew it, it was the night of the ball. I waited as Bustopher Jones took a seat before the other Jellicles and regaled them of some tuna he'd had for lunch. Munkustrap bowed deeply and trotted straight to me. "Are you ready?"

"Huh?" I worked to give him my full attention. He was the first to receive that honor in days.

"For your act." He said. "Are you ready to go on?"

"Oh.. no. I- I got distracted."

"Do you want me to skip you?" He asked with a bit of a smile.

He nodded slowly. I felt a smile tug my lips and turned away, embarrassed. "Yes."

He craned his neck around to get a look at me again. "You can always try again next year."

"I don't think so." I said. "I think I'll try something else."

"Okay." He sounded satisfied with himself, but I didn't even mind. I was wrapped up in the sense of visibility I’d discovered.

I addressed him more cordially. "I hope I haven't messed up your schedule by dropping out... that I didn't ruin the evening."

"Oh don't worry." He nudged me a little. "I'm sure there's a story I can tell."

I watched him prance back into the limelight, launching a song that drew the rest around him and especially delighted the kittens. I wanted to be there, too. What was stopping me? What was always stopping me? I gave the Heavyside Layer a backward glance, slipped off the pipe, and joined the ball.


End file.
